I've been playing Dark Souls 2, and while it's not as good as the first Dark Souls, I'm still enjoying it a lot. Besides not being as refined as the first game, it has some odd design decisions such as not being able to level at any bonfire, enemies not respawning, making Estus Flasks more exclusive, the addition of Lifegems, etc. It also has a bit more cheese, i.e. being able to kill quite a few enemies and bosses by just circling around them and attacking them in the back when the opportunity presents itself. Again, I'm still having a lot of fun, but it's to the first game as a game like Aion is to World of Warcraft: close, but no cigar.

Hey kids - looking for something new to play. My system is a few years old but can handle most games from up to a couple of years ago.

I play mostly Diablo III and Left For Dead 2.

Also enjoy some simulators... I really liked Car Mechanic Simulator 2015 but the newer one was too slow and they changed the interface, making it shittier. Also have House Flipper which is pretty good but started to get borring.

Play a little Hearthstone or the old MTG card game once in a blue moon.

So looking for some suggestions for a decent first person shooter to try, or a new simulator, or both.

Simwise: Tried a farming sim but didn't like it. Used to do Civilization and SimCity back in the day but I'd like to try something else. I know there's theme park sims, which sound fun. No interest in The Sims games or flight simulators.

Shooter-wise: Never tried any of the Call of Duty games but as I understand it they're quite popular. Used to be a bigtime Doom player back in the day but I don't like the last couple that came out. No interest in Half Life or Bioshock. Halo was okay but never grabbed me.

Prefer something on GOG or Steam.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

Shepherds we shall be, for thee, my Lord, for thee.
Power hath descended forth from Thy hand, our feet may swiftly carry out Thy commands.
So we shall flow a river forth to Thee and teeming with souls shall it ever be.
In Nomeni Patri Et Fili Spiritus Sancti.

I liked D3 a lot, too, but Path of Exile reminds me a lot of an evolved Diablo II.

Holy shit - it's free?

Shepherds we shall be, for thee, my Lord, for thee.
Power hath descended forth from Thy hand, our feet may swiftly carry out Thy commands.
So we shall flow a river forth to Thee and teeming with souls shall it ever be.
In Nomeni Patri Et Fili Spiritus Sancti.

Death Proof wrote:Hey kids - looking for something new to play. My system is a few years old but can handle most games from up to a couple of years ago.

I play mostly Diablo III and Left For Dead 2.

Also enjoy some simulators... I really liked Car Mechanic Simulator 2015 but the newer one was too slow and they changed the interface, making it shittier. Also have House Flipper which is pretty good but started to get borring.

Play a little Hearthstone or the old MTG card game once in a blue moon.

So looking for some suggestions for a decent first person shooter to try, or a new simulator, or both.

Simwise: Tried a farming sim but didn't like it. Used to do Civilization and SimCity back in the day but I'd like to try something else. I know there's theme park sims, which sound fun. No interest in The Sims games or flight simulators.

Shooter-wise: Never tried any of the Call of Duty games but as I understand it they're quite popular. Used to be a bigtime Doom player back in the day but I don't like the last couple that came out. No interest in Half Life or Bioshock. Halo was okay but never grabbed me.

Prefer something on GOG or Steam.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

The Doom remake and the new Wolfenstein games are all terrific shooters. Can’t go wrong with Rollercoaster Tycoon.

But I’ve been elbow deep in Red Dead Redemption 2 which is more open world exploration third person action RPG.

So after about 20-25 hours at Red Dead Redemption 2, I can say what many are saying, that it is a gorgeous, heavily flawed, engaging, but clunky sprawl of a game.
It took me about 9 hours of game time to feel like I could competently play the game, and I mean just do the things you need to do to get around in the world without accidentally shooting someone's foot off when you were trying to tell them hello, ride my horse at full speeds without being killed running into a rock, figure out how bullet-time works so you can survive, get my rope skills at least modestly acceptable, figure out what the fuck to do in the camp, and a few other things. For about 10 hours I felt like I kinda had a handle on the game and I could finally just enjoy it, but then different things happened that still made it a slog as often as its an adventure. At one point I had large bounties on me everywhere on the map that was uncovered, and I hadn't intended to harm a soul. The game just kept putting me in situations in which I had no choice but to kill cops, lots and lots of cops (or lawmen, as they are called), or I would get in a fight where someone else hit me first but I would get arrested for assault, or someone would draw on me and I would kill them and then be warned for murder, etc.
My favorite part was when I tried to say hi to a guy I was passing and actually jumped on his wagon, hit him, threw him off, and stole his wagon... because I hit the right button at the wrong time. If I'd hit it like a second or two earlier, I would have said, "Howdy Mister", but when I hit it I activated stealing this guy's wagon and getting another bounty on my head, which is why I say it's clunky.
It's hard to not enjoy riding around the west and having encounters and such, but when I say "clunky", I am not joking. Still deciding if I want to continue to play through it or not, as, after 20-30 hours invested, I am still not invested, myself, in any story, if there is one.

Yeah I’m loving RDR2 but the controls take A LOT of getting used to. You have to be super careful with everything you do. Why the draw your gun button and the greet people button are the same button is a mind-boggling choice. But I got the hang of things pretty quick and as long as I don’t let my guard down about which buttons I’m hitting I do fine. But yeah not intuitive.

You can pay off your bounties at the mail icons on the map. And if you intend to commit a crime wearing your bandana over your face then changing clothes and horse after helps you not get wanted.

Death Proof wrote:Hey kids - looking for something new to play. My system is a few years old but can handle most games from up to a couple of years ago.

I play mostly Diablo III and Left For Dead 2.

Also enjoy some simulators... I really liked Car Mechanic Simulator 2015 but the newer one was too slow and they changed the interface, making it shittier. Also have House Flipper which is pretty good but started to get borring.

Play a little Hearthstone or the old MTG card game once in a blue moon.

So looking for some suggestions for a decent first person shooter to try, or a new simulator, or both.

Simwise: Tried a farming sim but didn't like it. Used to do Civilization and SimCity back in the day but I'd like to try something else. I know there's theme park sims, which sound fun. No interest in The Sims games or flight simulators.

Shooter-wise: Never tried any of the Call of Duty games but as I understand it they're quite popular. Used to be a bigtime Doom player back in the day but I don't like the last couple that came out. No interest in Half Life or Bioshock. Halo was okay but never grabbed me.

Prefer something on GOG or Steam.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

You might like Grim Dawn. It's a Diablo-style game set in a post-apocalyptic world with zombies.
Victor Vran, which is similar in style and set in a Gothic fantasy world, is also good fun.

Torgo wrote:You might like Grim Dawn. It's a Diablo-style game set in a post-apocalyptic world with zombies.
Victor Vran, which is similar in style and set in a Gothic fantasy world, is also good fun.

Those sound good - I'll check them out this weekend. Thanks!

Shepherds we shall be, for thee, my Lord, for thee.
Power hath descended forth from Thy hand, our feet may swiftly carry out Thy commands.
So we shall flow a river forth to Thee and teeming with souls shall it ever be.
In Nomeni Patri Et Fili Spiritus Sancti.

Deschain13 wrote:Yeah I’m loving RDR2 but the controls take A LOT of getting used to. You have to be super careful with everything you do. Why the draw your gun button and the greet people button are the same button is a mind-boggling choice. But I got the hang of things pretty quick and as long as I don’t let my guard down about which buttons I’m hitting I do fine. But yeah not intuitive.

You can pay off your bounties at the mail icons on the map. And if you intend to commit a crime wearing your bandana over your face then changing clothes and horse after helps you not get wanted.

I've paid off bounties but it's taken several days of just committing more crimes, not all of which have gone well.
I don't think I understood that this game would force me to be a criminal no matter what choices I tried to make. I do not especially enjoy that. There's a reason I quit Grand Theft Auto and I didn't realize this was just a western rehash of that. The previous one gave you plenty of room to be the hero if you preferred that to being the villain.
It's really hard not to be the villain in this game. It takes about 20 deer to get you the same money as just stealing one good coach.
And the storyline keeps forcing me to kill lots of cops. Not necessarily something I love in my fantasy considering the real-world climate these days.
Finally, the tonal dissonance is a bit hard to deal with too. If I just straight up murder everybody at the

Klan rally

, without provocation or anyone reaching for their weapons, I actually GAIN HONOR and arouse no pursuit from the law. However, if I shoot back at, and kill, some cranky fucker who just drew and fired on me, is actually trying to kill me, because I merely walked too close to his campsite, I am immediately wanted for murder, get a bounty, and lose Honor. For straight-up self-defense. I mean, seriously, at the former I just shot a dude who hadn't even spotted me yet right in the chest and then shot pretty much everyone else in the face and there were no consequences, while in the latter I actually shot one dude, who was trying to kill me, in the hand to disarm him and when he still tried to kill me after that, I finally gave in and shot him down. And I'm wanted for murder. Has me shaking my head all the time.

Ace wrote:You have to have your Bandana on so that they dont identify you. So when you have your Bandana on it's harder to indentify. Also change your clothes and they wont find you.

Yeah, I get that. I don't get why when I return fire on somebody who's actually shot me, it ends up being Murder. And I don't have my mask up when I'm being shot unexpectedly. And what the fuck are they always shooting at me for anyway. I'm literally just walking by your campfire. You do not have to threaten my life for that.

Wooley wrote:
Yeah, I get that. I don't get why when I return fire on somebody who's actually shot me, it ends up being Murder. And I don't have my mask up when I'm being shot unexpectedly. And what the fuck are they always shooting at me for anyway. I'm literally just walking by your campfire. You do not have to threaten my life for that.

Yeah everyone seems so hostile. Unless that was tied to your honor.

Co host of the Film Raiders Podcast.
Were on Spotify, Itunes, SoundCloud, Stitcher, TuneIn, Blubrr,Iheartradio and many more.

Wooley wrote:
Yeah, I get that. I don't get why when I return fire on somebody who's actually shot me, it ends up being Murder. And I don't have my mask up when I'm being shot unexpectedly. And what the fuck are they always shooting at me for anyway. I'm literally just walking by your campfire. You do not have to threaten my life for that.

Yeah some people don’t want you near your camp or they’ll start shooting. They’re innocent people defending their site so if you kill them that’s murder. I’ve bumped my horse into someone else on a horse and they start shooting.

If they’re a rival gang thought he’s a whole different story. You can kill them with reckless abandon and nobody cares. In fact one of my favorite things to do in the game is break into houses to find a gang passed out drunk from celebrating a robbery, getting into a gunfight with them, then taking the money they stole for myself.

My honor is about 80% to the white side, but it keeps getting knocked down by these little incidents. I didn't wanna kill a guy by his campfire, but he just got up and threatened me and then shot me. What was I supposed to do? Then, he's dead so I looted him (why wouldn't you?) and THAT hurt my honor. I kill 10 cops in a main-story train-robbery and my honor's fine but I kill a guy who shot me for no reason and kept shooting and suddenly I'm the fuckin' bad guy. That's what I struggle with with this game. It's pretty and it's big, but it has a LOT of issues.
Hoping Fallout 76 will work out better but now I'm hearing they went MMO a la Mass Effect: Andromeda.
Also, does this game even have a story?

Anyway, my takeaway after about 30 hours in this game is Red Dead Redemption > Red Dead Redemption 2.

You must be playing the game entirely wrong or something, I don't know what to tell you but quit doing it wrong. Quit worrying about the arbitrary stuff like honor, it literally doesn't matter. You are getting caught up on systems which provide no real weight to the overall experience, it's just there as an option. Quit playing it like GTA, it isn't GTA and will clamp down on you if you try

I finished the story in 40-50 hours and it was a fantastic story, just focus on that, do the yellow missions and maybe a stranger here and there

The Nameless One wrote:You must be playing the game entirely wrong or something, I don't know what to tell you but quit doing it wrong. Quit worrying about the arbitrary stuff like honor, it literally doesn't matter. You are getting caught up on systems which provide no real weight to the overall experience, it's just there as an option. Quit playing it like GTA, it isn't GTA and will clamp down on you if you try

I finished the story in 40-50 hours and it was a fantastic story, just focus on that, do the yellow missions and maybe a stranger here and there

*disappears forever again*

I didn't play GTA. I started it, hated it, quit it. Never played again.
Honor does matter to me (and I don't mean that in a big, real-life way), it helps with store prices and how you are treated in the game, it helps create the sense of who you are in this world. If it doesn't matter, why do they have it?
I've done a bunch of missions and so far there has been no actual story just the gang occasionally doing shit.
I wouldn't say I'm "hung up on systems" I would say the systems are not very good and so they are hanging me up.

Wooley wrote:I didn't play GTA. I started it, hated it, quit it. Never played again.
Honor does matter to me (and I don't mean that in a big, real-life way), it helps with store prices and how you are treated in the game, it helps create the sense of who you are in this world. If it doesn't matter, why do they have it?
I've done a bunch of missions and so far there has been no actual story just the gang occasionally doing shit.
I wouldn't say I'm "hung up on systems" I would say the systems are not very good and so they are hanging me up.

If you focus on the story those systems become more arbitrary because events with actual narrative weight occur and you are forced from a particular town or city. Like, I never once had to worry about going to a store beyond my initial stock up, and cost becomes irrelevant as you pull off missions (I sat around $3k through the majority of my playthrough). So, yes, there is argument to be had that the systems just do not really matter in wake of the narrative and it's trajectory. The game tends to provide you with what you need via playing through the story, it sounds like you are caught entirely in optional content land... the story moves, and it moves quick, I have no idea where this idea that there is no story is coming from aside from pure neglect of what the game is trying to offer in wake of, I dunno, expecting too much from it. It's not a very complex experience, just do the yellow missions and things will happen. Trust me, shit goes down

The Nameless One wrote:If you focus on the story those systems become more arbitrary because events with actual narrative weight occur and you are forced from a particular town or city. Like, I never once had to worry about going to a store beyond my initial stock up, and cost becomes irrelevant as you pull off missions (I sat around $3k through the majority of my playthrough). So, yes, there is argument to be had that the systems just do not really matter in wake of the narrative and it's trajectory. The game tends to provide you with what you need via playing through the story, it sounds like you are caught entirely in optional content land... the story moves, and it moves quick, I have no idea where this idea that there is no story is coming from aside from pure neglect of what the game is trying to offer in wake of, I dunno, expecting too much from it. It's not a very complex experience, just do the yellow missions and things will happen. Trust me, shit goes down

It's an open-world with tons of non-narrative content. Like Horizon: Zero Dawn. Except that in the latter, the whole time I was playing the game I felt like the world, the story, and the character were being developed.
So maybe another way to look at it is, if you don't just play the game mission-to-mission, which has never been my style or that of may people I know in open world games, then it seems that there is no story and that the gameplay is not that great and the mechanics are clunky. It is not like I am the only person saying this. Aside from the many articles written and all kinds of similar commentary on social media, my friends who are playing it are reflecting the exact same I'm having. It sounds, from what you're saying, as if it would have made sense for them to have made this an on-rails game instead of a sandbox. And I do understand that "shit goes down", I continuously end up murdering a lot of people being forced into situations and to make choices I never ever would.
And hey, it's still kinda fun. I just don't know that the balance of everything it gets wrong versus the things it does right is gonna make me bother much longer with it, certainly not once Fallout 76 comes out, but I may quit it sooner and just find something I think works better.

I picked it up once and haven't played it since. Granted mainly cuz I'm trying to level up my RocketPass but once that ends I'm goign to jump into it. Probably this Sunday since nothing big is happening then.

Co host of the Film Raiders Podcast.
Were on Spotify, Itunes, SoundCloud, Stitcher, TuneIn, Blubrr,Iheartradio and many more.

The Nameless One wrote:If you focus on the story those systems become more arbitrary because events with actual narrative weight occur and you are forced from a particular town or city. Like, I never once had to worry about going to a store beyond my initial stock up, and cost becomes irrelevant as you pull off missions (I sat around $3k through the majority of my playthrough). So, yes, there is argument to be had that the systems just do not really matter in wake of the narrative and it's trajectory. The game tends to provide you with what you need via playing through the story, it sounds like you are caught entirely in optional content land... the story moves, and it moves quick, I have no idea where this idea that there is no story is coming from aside from pure neglect of what the game is trying to offer in wake of, I dunno, expecting too much from it. It's not a very complex experience, just do the yellow missions and things will happen. Trust me, shit goes down

Apparently, the latest game from Warren Spector (Deus Ex), Underworld Ascendant, is one of the worst, if not the worst, game of the year. It makes me feel like an idiot for giving it a few bucks on Kickstarter.

Deschain13 wrote:
If you’re a fan of Metroidvanias then Hollow Knight is excellent.

It is pretty great. I played it yesterday evening and it was after midnight before I realized it. It has the best aspects of Shovel Knight, Super Metroid and Dark Souls rolled into one. The uniqueness and quality of the aesthetics and music are the icing on the cake.
I also picked up Super Bomberman R, The Binding of Isaac: Afterbirth and Snipperclips. They're all great co-op games, but man, Isaac is brutally difficult. I'll win the lottery before I start a boss battle with more than half a heart remaining.

Torgo wrote:It is pretty great. I played it yesterday evening and it was after midnight before I realized it. It has the best aspects of Shovel Knight, Super Metroid and Dark Souls rolled into one. The uniqueness and quality of the aesthetics and music are the icing on the cake.
I also picked up Super Bomberman R, The Binding of Isaac: Afterbirth and Snipperclips. They're all great co-op games, but man, Isaac is brutally difficult. I'll win the lottery before I start a boss battle with more than half a heart remaining.

Oh good goddamn I love Binding of Isaac so much. It’s my most played game on my Xbox by a lot. But yeah it can be super hard especially if you don’t get a good run of items. Eventually you’ll pick up on ways to improve your odds the more runs you do.

Wooley wrote:
For someone who really prefers stealth games above all others, this was cool for me, thanks.

Welcome! And of course, '98 wasn't just big for stealth games specifically, as looking back at it, with classics like Panzer Dragoon Saga, Half-Life, Metal Gear Solid, & Ocarina Of Time coming out on every single platform all in the same 12 month period, and as far as I'm concerned, there's really no better year in the history of the medium, at least not around the time I was coming of age, y'know? What a time to be alive, what a time...

Stu wrote:Welcome! And of course, '98 wasn't just big for stealth games specifically, as looking back at it, with classics like Panzer Dragoon Saga, Half-Life, Metal Gear Solid, & Ocarina Of Time coming out on every single platform all in the same 12 month period, and as far as I'm concerned, there's really no better year in the history of the medium, at least not around the time I was coming of age, y'know? What a time to be alive, what a time...

Yeah, Metal Gear Solid absolutely, completely blew my mind. I had never played anything like it and it is one of the games that got me back into playing video games as an adult (along with Diablo and Twisted Metal 2). Those games completely changed my notion of what was possible in gaming and MG:S was probably the most fascinating game I had played up to that point. I mean, Doom is probably my favorite game of all time, and Bioshock is second, but after that we probably jump back to the late 90s for the next several.

I just finished Doom (2016). Man, what a rush. I'm a little disappointed with the final boss - he wasn't nearly as challenging as other bosses in the game - but the absolute cluster that is the lead up to facing the final boss makes up for it. Bethesda gets a lot of flack for the damage it has done to the Fallout franchise, but with this game and their Wolfenstein games, thank goodness there's a company making FPS's with spectacular single-player campaigns.

I started playing Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon. It's basically a combination of 8-bit Castlevania and Trine in that there are multiple characters you can switch between. It's not even close to being on the same level as 8-bit throwbacks like Shovel Knight, but it's enjoyable enough.

Torgo wrote:I just finished Doom (2016). Man, what a rush. I'm a little disappointed with the final boss - he wasn't nearly as challenging as other bosses in the game - but the absolute cluster that is the lead up to facing the final boss makes up for it. Bethesda gets a lot of flack for the damage it has done to the Fallout franchise, but with this game and their Wolfenstein games, thank goodness there's a company making FPS's with spectacular single-player campaigns.

I started playing Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon. It's basically a combination of 8-bit Castlevania and Trine in that there are multiple characters you can switch between. It's not even close to being on the same level as 8-bit throwbacks like Shovel Knight, but it's enjoyable enough.

I thought the final boss was a nice homage to the old games and I found it challenging the first time (I've played the game all the way through at least 3 times). But then, I generally don't like box-battles, as has been discussed in this thread before. I agree she was a little easier than one of the ones I fought in Hell.
They only made one bad Fallout game, right? I mean, it's not like the whole thing is dead.

Torgo wrote:I just finished Doom (2016). Man, what a rush. I'm a little disappointed with the final boss - he wasn't nearly as challenging as other bosses in the game - but the absolute cluster that is the lead up to facing the final boss makes up for it. Bethesda gets a lot of flack for the damage it has done to the Fallout franchise, but with this game and their Wolfenstein games, thank goodness there's a company making FPS's with spectacular single-player campaigns.

I started playing Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon. It's basically a combination of 8-bit Castlevania and Trine in that there are multiple characters you can switch between. It's not even close to being on the same level as 8-bit throwbacks like Shovel Knight, but it's enjoyable enough.

Yes Doom is amazing. A sequel got announced called Doom Eternal. I hope it makes it out this year.

Bloodstained is short and solid and only exists as a stretch goal for a full Bloodstained coming sometime this year also.

I’ve been playing the RE2 remake. I never really fell out of love with this franchise but this game makes me regret even thinking such a thing. It’s phenomenal.

Wooley wrote:
I thought the final boss was a nice homage to the old games and I found it challenging the first time (I've played the game all the way through at least 3 times). But then, I generally don't like box-battles, as has been discussed in this thread before. I agree she was a little easier than one of the ones I fought in Hell.
They only made one bad Fallout game, right? I mean, it's not like the whole thing is dead.

The spider is no slouch, but it's no Cyberdemon. Man, did that thing make me tear (what little hair I have) out!
As for Fallout, the fourth one has a lot of haters. I've only played it a little while and I like it so far, but man, I'm ready to put the community organizing on hold and go hunting, questing and exploring.